FAMILY MIMIDAE 



less faintly with gray across breast; axillars and underwing coverts 

 white, marked indistinctly with dusky. Immatures are more brownish 

 above. 



Iris yellow; bill black; tarsus and toes fuscous. 



M easurements. — Males ( 10 from the range of the race in Colombia) , 

 wing 116.2-129.5 (121.7), tail 119.7-128.7 (125.4), culmen from base 

 21.5-25.1, (23.1, average of 9), tarsus 31.9-35.9 (34.7) mm. 



Females (10 from the range of the race in Colombia), wing 112.1- 

 128.0 (117.6), tail 110.2-128.5 (116.1), culmen from base 20.2-25.7 

 (23.2), tarsus 31.7-35.8 (33.2) mm. 



Introduced. Common in the Canal Zone and adjacent Colon and 

 Province of Panama, on both slopes, in cleared, especially residential, 

 areas, east at least to Portobello, Colon, and, on the Pacific slope, to 

 Canita, near the Bayano Dam site, where Ridgely (in litt.) found a 

 pair on December 29, 1974. 



Introduced from its range in western and central Colombia, its pres- 

 ence is due apparently to birds released through customs control, and 

 probably in part also by escape from cages. 



The first definite report of this mockingbird in Panama that has come 

 to attention is that of Herbert G. Deignan (Auk, 1933, p. 125) who 

 wrote that "On July 13, 1932, while standing in front of the Balboa 

 station of the Panama Railroad, I heard the song of a mocking bird 

 and discovered the bird perched at the top of a flagpole nearby." Arbib 

 and Loetscher (Auk, 1935, p. 326) listed the mockingbird from the 

 Canal Zone in summer, 1934, but were told (in error) that it had been 

 introduced from California. Chapman (Auk, 1941, pp. 98-99), in 

 January 1938, recorded a pair at the Gorgas Memorial Institute in 

 Panama City, and at Balboa, and mentioned that it was reported at 

 Pedro Miguel "breeding" near Ancon. In 1938 and 1939, he secured 

 specimens, which he found were Mimus gilvus of South America, and 

 not M. polyglottos of North America, as some had supposed, referring 

 them to the Venezuelan melanopterus. 



Earlier, Tollef Monniche had collected a male, August 23, 1937, at 

 the Finca Lerida above Boquete, Chiriqui. This, Blake (Fieldiana, 

 Zool. vol. 36, no. 5, 1958, p. 548) in his account of the Monniche collec- 

 tion, considered to be a locally-escaped cage bird, and not an extension 

 of range from the far distant Canal Zone. The spread had begun, how- 

 ever, and in February 1952, 1 recorded several and collected a male near 

 the mouth of the Rio Indio in western Province of Colon. Here also 

 they may have become established through release of cage birds. 



